fallout
by cizzi-B
Summary: Jeremy deals with guilt over Bonnie's death and struggles to honor her last wishes.Bonnie finds the afterlife is not quite as peaceful as she would have hoped and mourns what she has lost, and Silas is determined to get Qetsiyah's attention.
1. Chapter 1

Jeremy Gilbert was alive but he didn't feel deserving of it. Guilt gnawed at him when he thought of Bonnie's sacrifice; how she died the way he feared she would: overcome by her magic.

It had all been for him too, and now he was here and she was over there and there was nothing he could do to bring her back. If he had known he would have stopped her, would have made her see sense, that it wasn't worth it, that him staying on the other side was right and natural, that it was as right as her living and going to college with her friends and having a happy, long life. But now he was here and she was over there. Words she had used when they had argued over the danger she was putting herself in with her magic came to mind as if his brain was conspiring against him to make him feel worse

"Do you think I was born with these powers to float feathers and light candles?" _no but you weren't born to kill yourself with them either. _It had been 6 days since he had found her body and 7 since he found out she had died. The days following her death, Jeremy had been on edge, constantly watching his words. He was afraid of letting something slip and disrespecting Bonnie's last wish of her friends not knowing until it was absolutely necessary. Sometimes though the temptation to just break down and cry was almost too much, especially when Elena babbled on happily about college and how it was just the fresh start she, Bonnie and Caroline needed. He wanted to tell her so badly just so he would have someone to talk to about, but he knew he couldn't, he couldn't tell anyone yet and had been spending as much alone as possible for the past few days as possible. If he couldn't talk about it he'd rather be alone to alone to wallow in it.

When he had found her, he had been surprised to see how serene she looked. She could almost have been asleep, or-as there had been some blood around her nose-passed out from using too much magic. Jeremy wished she had been. He had gotten as close as he could without actually touching her, before sinking to his knees. He was almost afraid to touch her, to touch her would be to feel that the body in front him was actually Bonnie and this was actually real and not just some nightmare. He had eventually plucked up the courage to move closer and pick up her. He had come at night, and he could only hope that the area looked deserted as it seemed. After he had put Bonnie gently into the trunk of his car, he drove without paying much attention to where he was going. When he finally started paying attention to his surroundings he realised he had drove to a spot not far from the witch house. _It wouldn't be so bad_, _burying her here, would it? _He had thought to himself, fear and doubt causing him to grip the steering wheel so tightly his knuckles whitened. He didn't want to open the trunk and see Bonnie's serene face staring back at him. But he had to, and taking a deep breath he prepared himself for what he had to do. A week later he still felt a sick feeling in his stomach when he thought of Bonnie in ground, covered over with dirt, her face permanently frozen in a blank stare.

She promised they could talk all the time due to Jeremy's ability, but he hadn't heard from her in the week since she passed. He had started to worry that maybe he had lost his ability since Bonnie brought him back life but He didn't like that idea so he shoved it to the back of his mind and didn't let the idea take hold. The idea he might not be able to even talk to her anymore is one he can't bear just yet.

Bonnie had only formed a vague picture in her head of what the afterlife would like. When she was a kid she had imagined a place full of light and angels. When she got a bit older she just imagined a paradise where everyone was at peace. Recently, she had starting hoping just for a place where people were at peace, even if it wasn't exactly a paradise.

The place she had ended up after she crossed over with grams was not a paradise, though it was beautiful place. A forest that bordered a lake surrounded by a wood cabins with spacious porches and contemporary interiors. grams informed her though, that it wasn't always like that, some days it was beach resort, other times it just resembled a normal town. It all depended on Qetsiyah's mood.

Bonnie was not unhappy there but she wasn't entirely happy either. A part of her still felt that she belonged back over there, back with her friends, getting ready for college, enjoying summer. But she tried to not give that part too much power because it made her feel something that was an awful lot like regret. How terrible would that be? To regret that she had given Jeremy back his life? Really, she was happy that he was alive, but she wished it wasn't paid for with her life.

In the week since she had crossed over to the other side, she had a lot of time to think about what had happened. She remembered the rush of power she felt before she cast that spell that brought Jeremy back, how she felt for just a moment that she _could_ have what she wanted. A rush of power so overpowering it caused her to ignore her grams warnings. It scared when she thought about it sometimes, that she could feel so powerful yet so out of control at the same time.

As she laid down on the bed in the cabin she shared with her grams, she wondered what her friends were doing. Were they going to parties? Were they hanging out in the grill? Worrying about going to college in the fall? Were they worrying about her? She wondered did they know what really happened or had Jeremy told the lie she told him to. She wondered if he was ok and safe. She wasn't ready yet to do anything but wonder. She couldn't go and watch them and she couldn't go and talk to Jeremy like he promised. She didn't want to go and be hit in the face with what she lost, she couldn't bear it. Bonnie had not finished mourning her own life, So she stayed where she was, putting the pieces of herself back together.


	2. bloody chaos

A loud, anguished scream shocked Bonnie awake, causing her to shoot up into a sitting position and look wildly around her darkened room.

"Grams? Are you ok?" Bonnie called out, sounding panicked .Images of her Grams when Bonnie had tried to bring Elena back to life and angered the spirits, sprung to the forefront of her mind.

"I'm fine! Stay where you are!" Sheila answered back. The steady and determined tone of her voice calmed Bonnie a little, at least Grams sounded ok, despite her ominous warning, but she still felt unnerved by the scream. What could have happened that would have caused someone to scream like that?

Bonnie Jumped out of bed and headed towards the window. She wasn't about to disobey her grams and leave her room, but she couldn't wait in ignorance either. She pulled back the heavy red and gold curtains, and stared out the window with a dazed expression on her face before stepping back slowly in horror. Blood was falling like rain, staining anything it fell on, Some of the cabins were falling apart, there roofs caving in, seemingly, without any outside provocation. Bonnie could see people rushing out of these wrecks of houses before they fell, she could see people that tried to get out too late, She could see them trapped under the debris and could hear them scream, the same type of scream that shocked her awake. It was chaos.

"Grams, what's going on?" Bonnie called out, panic clear in her tone moving to go open the door. She moved to take a step forward only to find that there was no floor past her door, instead there was sheer drop to the ground floor of her and Sheila's wooden cabin. Bonnie stepped back, panic causing her to trip on her own feet as she scrambled back from the edge. She couldn't understand how the first floor hadn't caved in with a whole chunk of its centre missing, couldn't understand how her and Sheila were still relatively unharmed and not in some kind of agony like the witches and other members of the supernatural world outside. The sounds of screaming was now mixed with groans of vampires as the smell of the blood all around them became too much. Bonnie closed her eyes and put her hands against her ears, trying to block out the sound . She wondered if this was ever going to end or if this peaceful place had become some kind of hell.

Then there was silence.

Bonnie didn't notice at first that everything had gone silent, the noise had ingrained itself so far in her brain. When she did notice, she picked herself up of the floor and moved cautiously towards the window. From there, she could see people slowly make their way towards the centre of the circle of houses looking dazed and confused. She could see the houses that had collapsed had somehow repaired themselves and the people who Bonnie had seen be crushed underneath the weight of the collapsed houses seemed perfectly fine, if not looking a bit startled and confused.

When she turned away from the window she saw the door open to reveal Sheila Bennett with a concerned expression on her face "Baby, are you ok?"

"Yeah I…" Bonnie stopped herself and turned away from her grandmother to look out the window "what happened?"

"I have an idea, but I can't be sure, I know someone who might though"

"ok I'll just get dressed and we'll go"

Bonnie moved to go get a sweater to tug over the light t-shirt she had worn to bed.

"Do you think it could be Silas?, could he have developed his powers enough to -"

Sheila placed a comforting hand on her granddaughters shoulder "we don't know anything for sure yet, try not to worry too much"

"who are we going to meet anyway?"

"Qetsiyah"


End file.
